Actionable articles and insights for busy executives

Category: Organizational Development
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Why do we hate change? The answer can be found in human evolution. Since millions of years ago, the human brain perceives strangeness (or strangers for that matter) as a sign of danger or even a life-threatening event. Our brains are hard-wired to react negatively to and to resist change. Organizations face the same challenges of inevitable resistance to change. According to one study by the Center for Creative Leadership, 75% of change initiatives fail because of this resistance. .. Continue reading

The way organizations are structured and run today is essentially outdated. Disillusionment and lack of engagement are commonplace and most people regard their work as filling in time and unexciting. Managers try different incentives from training to monetary rewards to company retreats without getting any lasting, positive outcome. So is a new kind of organization the answer?

Ask CEO’s and senior management of large companies in any sector and it will become apparent that many of them – in fact the vast majority – are not satisfied that their strategic planning process is working. There seems to be a belief that these processes are essentially a waste of time and distract the organization away from focusing on core issues. This belief incidentally is not just restricted to large organizations – it is an even bigger concern for not so large companies with limited resources….

This article is based on the 5-Stage model originally proposed by author Elisabeth Kubler-Ross

Any kind of change involves the loss of something: status quo, possessions, relationships, etc. The 5-Stage model suggested by Elisabeth Kubler-Ross in a book related to loss of life (an extreme form of loss) has been also used to explain how people react to change…

The information in this article is based on published research carried out by Center for Creative Leadership (CCL)…

The way the priority and the focus on leadership has changed is a function of how organizational and leadership thinking has evolved over the last 30 years or so. To illustrate the difference, we contrast across various situations what leadership used to be and what it means now:

Read any book about organizational success – whether in a multinational or a small business – and the key to organizational success is related to something business-like: leadership, sales, customer care, profitability, etc. Any reference to recreation and fun is almost always as an add-on. For example, a company retreat with balloons and treasure hunts once a year or a sports day or a company lunch once a quarter. HR managers lecture line managers on the need to have such events so their fun-starved staff can get a chance to “loosen up”. Yet staff engagement remains low….

The SCARF Model was originally proposed by David Rock of the Neuro-Leadership Institute and has been acclaimed as one of the best and original ideas in management over the last 15 years.

In a world of increasing inter-connectedness and rapid change, there is a growing need to improve the way people work together. The study of the brain is starting to provide some key insights that can be applied in the real world – for example in the work place. Social neuroscience explores the biological foundations of the way humans relate to each other and to themselves in terms of emotional regulation, attitudes, stereotyping, empathy, status, fairness, collaboration, persuasion, morality, compassion, deception and trust…